Goddamned Shanghai

"It took more than one man to change my name to Shanghai Lily." - Marlene Dietrich

To the missionaries who stumbled green-faced and wobble-kneed off the bumboats in 1930s Shanghai, the city must have seemed a hellhole utterly damned beyond salvation. Heaving, pulsing filled with ritzy restaurants, opium dens, licensed whore houses, jazz clubs, greyhound racing tracks and a thriving underworld, Shanghai’s economic boom attracted not just big money-spenders and their big money-spending ways, but also an army of ne’er-do-wells profiteering from any scraps of opportunities they could scrounge up. Abundance ruled over Shanghai – luxury in smoky opium dens, in rich fabrics and dazzling jewels, and in the thin frames of Chinese whorehouses. Apart from that, political clashes between the left and right parties, as well as the encroaching threat from the Japanese, created a city on edge and an atmosphere of living-in-the-now.

From all these grew an identity that has remained iconic even till this day. No other era could conjure up an equivalent image of glamour, wealth, grit, crime, squalor and uncertainty as Shanghai in the 1930s. Where today merchants of thrift stores run the streets, once walked the thick-heeled soles of the Green Gang’s leader, Du Yuesheng 杜月笙, in his elegant suits and felt hats. The island6 art collective is smitten by the heady vibrance of the time and inspired to recreate its unique, bold beauty.

From the usual motifs that have become synonymous with the era, like opium beds, Charleston dances and highly slight qipaos, the island6 art collective reinterprets 1930s Shanghai with their signature touch, fusing disparate elements into an original, harmonious whole. Thus, LED animated glamour girls of Gracie’s Gals recline on paper cut opium beds, blowing smoke revisioned as electronic diodes that chase each other across a rice paper background. Neon signs light up old photographs of the ol’Bund, unrecognizable by anyone standing there today. Screen goddesses, reminiscent of Zhou Xuan 周璇, whirl across the diptych screen, their ageless grace immortalized by thousands of flashing, colored electronic dots. Antique furniture picked up from the trash piles of bull-dozed estates are given a new life not just with varnish and paint, but also with interactive LCD screens that are triggered by motion sensors, capturing within their scratched surfaces a sultry siren's image like a butterfly in a jar. And in addition to electronic art, the collective has also forayed into sculptural pieces, infusing the strong, static artworks with the humor and irreverence characteristic of László Hudec’s distinctive Art Deco style, evocative of the lingering evenings spent at the Park Hotel.

Through this island6 seeks to bring back to our collective consciousness one thing that is frequently forgotten in the wake of the sensational opulence of the 1930s – that this was a significant time of communication, experimentation and driving passion. Through blending different multimedia techniques, the collective reflects the meeting of East and West, the warring of old and new, the inexhaustible search for a new and better way to live in a city damned by gods but embraced by waves of denizens. island6 has captured these frozen figures of a time past, who stare out at us from within antique-style paravents and frames, filled with a palpable desire, strength and beauty that reaches out to us even to this day.

Let the Paramount Peaches lead you to the realm of a sensorial journey across a time where you intimately belong: and be the main character of Your Midnight Shanghai…

Exhibition	Goddamned Shanghai

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